Counter-narratives of educational excellence: free schools,success, and community-based schooling

The notion of ‘competitive excellence’ is an enduring cornerstone of UK educational policy. Most recently, expanding and adapting New Labour’s Academy project with the introduction of free schools, the Coalition’s approach advances and embeds competitive market-based forms of community engagement in education. Responding to this policy paradigm, this paper draws upon history in order to open up the notion of excellence. Through examining alternative practices of achievement and success in histories of community education, I aim to disturb the unquestioned attachment of educational excellence to the ideals of competitive meritocracy. Comparing across two community educational movements – Socialist Sunday Schools (established 1892) and Black Saturday Schools (established 1968) – I explore how achievement and excellence have been mobilised to very different educational aims. In distinct times and circumstances, both of these community initiatives practiced versions of educational achievement that challenged dominant knowledge hierarchies and underlying assumptions of incapability.     

Collaborative action research between schools,a continuing professional development centre for teachers and the university: a case study in Spain

This article describes a collaborative action research project developed over the course of the 2011/12 academic year in the Faculty of Education at Cordoba University (Spain). The RIECU school–continuing professional development centre for teachers–university learning network is part of this research process. The aim is to create and consolidate a community of practice made up of continuing professional development advisers to teachers, infant education teachers, university students who are training to become infant education teachers and university teaching staff. The most relevant findings, which respond to the questions raised, are: the action research conducted indicates that teamwork between teacher, adviser, researcher and university student is an effective strategy to facilitate the acquisition of professional competences among student teachers; and student-teachers involved in the case study have evolved in their conception and approach to childhood and have had the opportunity to learn by modelling the professional conduct of their mentor teachers.     

The problem of distributed leadership in schools

There is a vast and mainly enthusiastic literature on leadership. It has permeated virtually all sectors and the education sector has been particularly affected. The argument of this paper is that most of the literature and discussion about this issue is couched in terms of some fairly simple polarities: managers versus leaders, transactional versus transformational leaders, task‐focused versus people‐focused and so on. Moreover, recent analysis in education has begun to question the predominant focus on the head teacher as the leader but, so far, there has been little empirical work carried out on the meanings and implications of distributed leadership. The research reported here suggests that one crucial issue to be addressed is the dynamic of competition between leaders. Using a new conceptual framework, this article reports on a case study that reveals different interpretations of what leadership should entail and constitute at different levels of the organization. The paper shows that it is by no means enough to proselytize ‘leadership’ as if this will produce a set of approaches and behaviours that will unproblematically transform. On the contrary, different versions of what the transformed situation should look like can cause deep divisions.     

Computer supported collaborative learning in schools: a distributed approach

This paper briefly surveys current work in the emerging area of Computer Supported Collaborative Learning (CSCL) and describes how the technology can be extended to exploit communication between computers. A number of applications which might make use of network support, distributed CSCL, are reviewed and a simple prototype distributed CSCL application is described and evaluated. The work has highlighted issues concerning the value, viability and development of distributed CSCL software. It would appear that valuable opportunities for the development of such software exist but it is unclear how these applications might be developed using existing hardware. Conclusions are presented regarding the future of network supported CSCL.     

Belonging,school support and communication: Essential aspects of school success for students with cerebral palsy in mainstream schools

PurposeInvestigate successful school experiences for students with cerebral palsy (CP); identify and describe learning and participation at school.MethodsA phenomenologically-informed qualitative study using in-depth interviews with students (n = 7), parents (n = 11), teachers (n = 10), principals (n = 9), and allied health (n = 10) was conducted to investigate multiple perceptions. Thematic analysis occurred within and between groups.ResultsThree themes were identified: Students belong and benefit; Classroom enablers that help; Communication is crucial.ConclusionsStudents’ school experiences are enhanced by innovative classroom solutions that support classroom learning and involvement. Students rely on a diverse team that communicate well and implement individualised solutions that enable success.     

The interactive attribution of school success in multi-ethnic schools

The study shows how explanations for school success are expressed and dialogically constructed during teacher–parent conferences at school. Attribution theory is used to conceptualize the various explanations for school success that were expressed. However, instead of only looking at attributions as beliefs which individuals or groups ‘have’, the aim of this study is to show how attributions are part of co-constructed processes in which multiple partners impact upon each other’s attributions over the course of a conversation. The results indicated that in the conversations between teachers and minority parents, school performance is more often attributed to effort while in conversations with majority parents, psychological attributions were more common. Besides these differences in content, the process through which these accounts were constructed was different. While the diagnosis on what went wrong was more commonly constructed in case of the conversations with majority parents, they were more characterised by opposition or a passive position by the parent in case of the conversations with minority parents. The analyses show that instead of a simple mismatch between explanations of the home and the school, these explanations are interactionally co-constructed as both parents and teachers necessarily ‘re’-act on each other’s claims and understanding of school success. The results ultimately reveal how the interactive process impacted upon the construction of the attributions and the possibilities this creates for partnerships between parents and teachers to create an understanding of the child’s academic potential across home and school.     

在中职学校实施成功教育的几点思考

成功教育在当今的教学改革中起着很重要的作用,它认为学习困难的学生也和其他学生一样具有成功的潜能和成功的需求。中等职业教育要关注学生非智力因素,坚持鼓励性评价,以成功后的欢乐强化他们的学习动机,改变自卑心态,达到调动学习积极性的目的。     

Developing the role of schools as research organisations: the Sunfield experience

We are entering a new phase in learning about childhood disabilities. While we have found out much of what we need to know about their causes and aetiology, solutions to many of the challenges we will face in the future will come from the evidence base held by practitioners. Practitioners are ideally placed to carry out 'real world' research but they often need support in carrying out setting-based enquiry. In this article, Barry Carpenter, Chief Executive and Director of Research at Sunfield, discusses the relationship between academic and practitioner research and the role of practitioners as researchers. He goes on to explore the development of a research culture in special schools, focusing on Sunfield, a residential special school for children with severe and complex learning disabilities. Barry Carpenter shows how research projects at Sunfield have generated evidence which has guided the school's development. The inter-disciplinary approach adopted in this setting has encouraged involvement in research from many staff in diverse professions throughout the school.     

学校分布式领导概念新思维与领导力实践体系的集成

分布式领导是教育管理中一个新兴的领导学研究领域。面对复杂多变的学校环境,分布式领导是优化组织决策、促进教师员工参与管理的重要领导模式。因此,当学校处于变革发展的条件下,面临加倍动荡的环境时,必须用新的思维整合分布式领导概念,将领导者、追随者和情境放在一起理解。以形成更有效的学校组织结构和流程。     

Action research and the micropolitics in schools

This paper is based on the assumption that action research always affects the micropolitical balance characteristic of a certain school setting. The authors claim that micropolitics, that is the patterns of formal power and informal influence, has largely been neglected in the literature on action research in schools. This means that action researchers appear to be ‘micropolitically illiterate’. Firstly in the paper the authors present the concept of micropolitics and a model consisting of three arenas for understanding micropolitics in schools. Thereafter they exemplify the different aspects and expressions of micropolitics by referring to their own action research projects. The focus is particularly on initiative to and engagement with action research. Finally they reflect on some micropolitical dilemmas characteristic of action research and the contradictory role of the action researcher.     

The influence of research within religious education: the Westhill Seminars,RE professionals,pupils and schools

This article investigates the educational value of research studied by exploring the influence on a range of religious education professionals from a set of research seminars. The seminar series, sponsored by the Westhill Endowment Trust, has been running since 2004, bringing together teachers, advisors and higher education professionals working on religious education in UK schools and internationally. The seminars have been intended to develop the relationship between research and professionals, and they have generated a number of publications. Eleven seminars involving a total of 167 participants are analysed in terms of what participation in the seminars may have influenced (the professionals, pupils, schools), which aspects of the seminars were influential and why the seminars were influential. This article describes the process of developing appropriate methods to investigate both the influence of research seminars and the results of their use. The research includes a questionnaire and follow-up interviews. The most significant indications show that the seminars influenced pupils in schools and professionals; the publications from the seminars had a distinctive influence, and spending time to think and discuss about religious education was at least as influential as the presentations by researchers.     

The ideal of standards and the reality of schools: Needed research

Abstract: Research potentially can assist in the process of implementing the National Science Education Standards. Existing research shows that changes called for in the Standards are difficult to put into practice, create dilemmas for teachers, require significant changes in teachers' values and beliefs, are fostered when change is pursued within departments within schools, are influenced powerfully by teacher collaboration in the work context, are often resisted strongly by parents, and often demand new student roles and different student work. The results of research on reform do not give a definitive picture of the most productive roles for students, the nature of the desired student work, how teachers can best be engaged in reassessing values and beliefs and taking responsibility for acquiring new professional competencies, how to realize “science for all,” and the most effective ways of involving parents. Research is needed which will: (1) be approached from multiple perspectives, (2) be conducted in the “real world,” (3) focus on interventions into conventional school practice, (4) not assume change can be driven from the top down, (5) be interpretive in nature, (6) focus on student roles and student work, (7) give major attention to teacher learning, (8) attend to parents' concerns, and (9) be approached systemically. © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 38: 3–16, 2001     

Taking research into schools: the West Lothian Action Enquiry model

This paper outlines the efforts of an Educational Psychology Service (EPS) to develop its practice in the area of research. It will argue that the Action Enquiry model of service delivery can empower teaching staff and may allow an effective means of change and improvement to take place in schools. This model steers research towards providing information about what works in context and has given teachers the impetus and ownership to evaluate their practice and the impact of their interventions. The benefits of this approach are outlined along with a few notes of caution that readers are urged to consider when negotiating research within a school.